I was introduced to jazz, and that's become a basic concern and passion of mine ever since.

[I wanted] to play the clarinet well so I could be in Duke Ellington's band, but that's now impossible.

When I speak to students, I tell them why we have a First Amendment. I tell them about the Committees of Correspondence. I tell them how in a secret meeting of the Raleigh Tavern in Virginia, Thomas Jefferson and Patrick Henry, who did not agree with each other, started a Committee of Correspondence.

My chronology is terrible. [Work with William Shawn] must have some ago. It was after he was fired by Newhouse. After New - when Newhouse bought The New Yorker, he said in one of those grand press

Duke Ellington had a song, "What Am I Here For?" - this is what being pro-life is.

When I approached one of his secretaries for an interview, I was told that Bob [Dylan] didn't want to see me anymore because of what my wife Margot [Hentoff] had written.

The most recent example and the most, I think, appalling example was when Martin Peretz, the owner - and I stress owner - of The New Republic fired a journalist who I think was uncommonly skilled and full of integrity and passion and all that stuff. But he had criticized regularly the former pupil and friend of Martin Peretz, Al Gore, so he was fired. That's contrarianist that went around - that did - that was not rewarded.